The gay NBA?

The not-so-famous John Amaechi, former NBA player, has come out and admitted publicly he is gay. I am struck that he is (only) "the sixth professional male athlete from one of the four major U.S. sports — basketball, baseball, football, hockey — to openly discuss his homosexuality."

Those are scant numbers, why? I see a few hypotheses:

1. There aren’t so many gay professional athletes, maybe because guys play college ball to get women.

2. Even the not-so-famous earn endorsement income, at some level or another, or at least hope to, and that implies a mainstream image.

3. Fans don’t want to see gay players, or at least they do not want to know too explicitly about sexuality in that manner. Major league sports are about numbers of fans, not the possibly intense minority loyalties that could be generated if a major star came out of the closet.

I have another idea: Maybe the rate of homosexuality is not as large as some assume? There are those who assume that gay men are naturally that way and that 5%, 10%, 50%, whatever percentage you want to assume, are gay. But how do we know this? Is it possible that being gay is more learned than inherited?

That is, in certain environments, i.e. a men’s college locker room, there is a lot of social importance on being straight, even to a point of boasting about being promiscuous. Thus, there are few gay men in professional sports. On the other hand, in an environment which encourages gayness, the odds of becoming gay would be much higher.

Perhaps not as P.C. an observation, but perhaps whatever makes gay men gay is inversely related to athletic ability, agressiveness, or whatever makes someone likely to be successful in a professional sports career.

I think you are missing a lot of other politically less correct possibilities.

I am no expert on the biological causes of homosexuality, but it is possible that these have correlating effects on the capability of playing the 4 major sports (unlikely, or weak imo).

A more likely possibility would be the scant numbers of gay athletes in those sports signal to young, gay athletes that other sports are more tolerent. This is not unlike your 1), but I think more likely.

And on your number two I am going to have to go all out and fundamentally criticize your world view*. While it may be financial, there are many other social factors that influence behavior. The culture of professional athletes may put enormous cultural/social pressure on not being gay that have nothing to do with Homo Economus (pardon the pun).

*When I was writing this my intention was to imply that the financial incentives are affected by social factors, and that it is likely that after decades of rightward drift, financial incentives will become relatively less influential than other social motivators such as status (or the two will become more decoupled).

I don’t fully understand. There are two ways of interpreting #2: either firms who use NBA players in advertisements don’t like gays, or consumers who buy stuff that is advertised by NBA players don’t like stuff that is advertised by gay NBA players. Since at the end of your post you disparage employer-based discrimination, I assume you mean the latter. But then #2 and #3 are the same in a Beckerian sense — both are customer discrimination, since NBA fans are presuambly the target audience for stuff advertised by NBA players, right?

“Keep in mind it is relatively easy to measure performance in sports.”

Yes. This would explain why you never hear any arguments about which players or teams are better. In fact, team sports are a social focus & topic of discussion precisely because we can always count on almost complete consensus as to the absolute worth of each of its participants.

My guess is #4 big time, with some of #’s 2 and 3.
The claim about athleticism and homosexuality
is just plain bogus. The evidence on both that
and #4 is that we have seen certain “individual”
sports where there have been quite a few
people coming out as gay, e.g. tennis and
ice skating. It is probably the dynamic of
team sports that pushes those who are into
the closet, or discourages them from joining
the team in the first place.

Isn’t IMAGE the most obvious answer? Gay men are stereotyped as more effeminate. The image of sports is the opposite for numerous reasons (physical intimidation, etc).

The same reason why we don’t see pink teams or unicorn mascots is the same reason why gay men don’t out themselves in sports. I don’t know if this stereotype is justified, as many are not, but image seems to be the most obvious answer.

Pro sports has-beens frequently make most of their income by being, basically, very minor celebrities. They do autograph signings, card shows, celebrity golf tournaments, basketball “camps”, local advertising, etc.; maybe they hope to catch on in broadcasting, as college/pro coaches, etc. Other common ex-jock jobs are starting a business (restaurants are popular).

Most of that involves having a broad appeal. Stars can get away with being non-wholesome (OTOH: How many endorsement contracts does Rodman have?) to some extent, but I doubt the also-ran can.

I think #4 is probably the leading cause. In team sports the dynamic within the team is extremely important. Some guy coming out of the closet (in the locker room) would more likely than not create a rift in the team and undermine overall performance.

To give an example of the importance of team unity, the members of the girls’ basketball and soccer teams at my former high school all decided to go lesbian shortly after I graduated. Apparently several basketball players hooked up during a tournament weekend, and the other team members got jealous that they weren’t included. By the end of the school year it seemed like half the female athletes had girlfriends.

Of course very few of those girls are still practicing lesbians, which only reinforces the importance of peer pressure in these situations.

Curiously Brady Anderson was actively promoted in the gay community by the Orioles even though wasn’t/isn’t (?) gay. So there probably isn’t management side pressure against coming out. They seem willing to pursue that segment of the audience. A gay player could get a bump from specialist appeal.

I don’t think the marketing endorsement side is that much of a problem. For most players it could even even be an endorsement booster since the endorsement potential is probably a lopsided affair with all the money going to the top stars and the rest getting car dealership commercials at best.

Are there any numbers for gay footballers/rugby players in Europe? Perhaps a different culture would have different pressures.

You can tell how few gay male athletes there are in most sports by looking at how few died of AIDS in the 1980s. Figure skating was decimated by AIDS: both Olympic Men’s Figure Skating gold medalists from the 1970s died of AIDS, but AIDS deaths in other sports were quite low: one NFL player, one major league baseball player, no golfers, etc.

As I wrote in my 1994 National Review article “Why Lesbians Aren’t Gay:”

“Many heterosexual men and lesbian women are enthusiasts for golf, as well as other hit-a-ball-with-a-stick games like softball and pool. Lesbian-feminist sportswriter Mariah Burton Nelson recently estimated, not implausibly, that 30% of the Ladies Professional Golf Association women touring pros were lesbians. While such estimates are hard to verify, it’s clear that the marketers at the LPGA desperately wish they had more mothers-of-three like Nancy Lopez, the most popular woman golfer ever: i.e., a victorious yet still feminine champion with whom other heterosexual women enjoy identifying.

“In contrast, pre-menopausal straight women and gay men typically find golf pointless. For example, despite incessant socialization toward golf, only one out of nine wives of PGA touring pros plays golf herself! And gay male golf fanatics are so rare that it’s difficult to even come up with an exception that proves this rule (which might explain why golfers wear those god-awful pants).”

Ever since, I’ve been looking for an instance of a gay male celebrity who is an avid recreational golfer. The one example I’ve come up with is the multi-talented movie actor Danny Kaye, who was apparently bisexual (he was married and had a child but is rumored to have had a long affair with Sir Larry Olivier).

Now, golf is not a team sport. The most common reason golf pros give in interviews for why they focused on golf as boys is because “you didn’t need a bunch of other guys to play.” Golf accomodates a whole bunch of lesbians — the first major championship of the year on the LPGA tour, the Nabisco in Palm Springs is one of the biggest lesbian rendevous in the United States each year. But the urge to hit a ball with a stick is just not very strong at all in gay males.

If you want to learn more about the important differences between lesbians and gay men, here’s my 1994 article:

Here’s an excerpt from a 2002 interview I did with Northwestern U. psychology professor J. Michael Bailey, the leading demographer of sexual orientation:

Q: What stereotypes [about homosexuals] have turned out to have some truth to them?

A: One big thing is occupational and recreational interests. In fact, hairdressers, professional dancers, actors and designers tend to be gay men, at least at much higher rates than their population rate, which is somewhere between 1 and 4 percent. And women who are in the armed services, or professional athletes (two of the three best all-time women’s tennis players are lesbian) [Billie Jean King and Martina Navratilova], are disproportionately lesbian.

Children who are sex-atypical do tend to become homosexual. Especially males. Boys who want to be girls become men who want men. Most very masculine girls probably become heterosexual women, but their rate of homosexuality is probably still higher than would be expected given the population rate of female homosexuality, which is probably less than 1 percent. …

Recently, we have shown that on average, gay men and lesbians are very different on average from straight people in the way they walk and speak. There is such a thing, evidently, as a gay voice. And lesbians tend to look different than straight women — in particular, they have shorter hairstyles. …

Q: Is it useful to investigate homosexuality in general, or do you need to focus separately on gay men and lesbians, because they tend to be different?

A: Gay men and lesbians are very different. In part, this is because in many gender-related traits, they have diverged in opposite directions. Gay men tend to be feminine compared with heterosexual men; lesbians tend to be masculine compared with heterosexual women. But they aren’t even mirror images of each other. You can draw no conclusions about gay men from a study of lesbians, or vice versa.

The sexual orientation distribution appears to be bimodal (or J-shaped) among males, with more homosexuals than bisexuals (and of course far more heterosexuals).

Among women, however, there are probably more bisexuals than homosexuals (and of course far more heterosexuals). In other words, it looks like a skewed but otherwise normal probability distribution.

The J-shaped curve among men is puzzling for scientists attempting to devise an evolutionary theory for the causes of male homosexuality because it implies some kind of “switch,” whereas the female curve simply looks like an accumulation of small changes — i.e., the more masculine a woman is, the more likely she is to be lesbian.

I have to say that I find Steve Sailer’s evidence quite persuasive — which leads to the explanation that there are fewer than average numbers of gay men in “big-4” sports because gay men tend to have other interests.

In particular, the use of AIDS rates as a proxy for numbers of gay men is reasonable (and ingenious).

I’m not sure that AIDS rates is a suitable proxy for numbers of gay men. It seems quite reasonable to me that highly-closeted gay men playing in major league sports would have an entirely different kind of sex life as compared to those who play sports where homosexuality is far more accepted.

“The popularity of military service among gay men” is mostly a gay male fantasy. AIDS rates among male soldiers were far below the national average. Lesbianism is more common in the military than male homosexuality. Look, the military exists to kill people and break things, and the kind of teenage boys who find that that an appealing career tend to be overwhelmingly heterosexual.

Wow. This is probably the largest collection of homophobic comments from obviously well educated people I think I’ve ever seen.

First of all, there’s no correlation whatsoever between athleticism or aggression and heterosexuality. There is a correlation between common stereotypes of homosexuality and a lack of aggression or athleticism, but that’s hardly the same thing. I’ve never seen any scientific evidence that suggests that being homosexual makes you whimpy. Anymore than there is evidence that lesbians are stronger, larger, or more athletic than the general population of women or that there is a disproportionate number of lesbians in the population of female athletes.

I find number 1 somewhat amusing – but the experience I had with gay men in college is that they’re just as likely to do college sports to attract male attention as heterosexual college athletes are attempting to attract female attention (you’ll notice the audience watching these displays of prowess tend to have a good mix of both men and women, and often more men than women).

I think it’s safe to say that if there is not a directly proportional number of homosexuals within the population of professional sports, I would be very surprised if it wasn’t close. Several commenters suggested that the percentage of homosexuality among the general population is not as high as commonly believed – those people should consider the fact that they likely have co-workers, neighbors, and acquaintances who are homosexual and they’re simply not aware of it. There’s no evidence that there are more homosexuals today than 50 years ago, but there are certainly more people known to be homosexual.

I think the thing that makes the most sense is that for all the above reasons – the myths about masculinity being more pervasive in the world of sports, the financial risk that comes from being in any way different from an established image, the supposed homophobia of sports fans in general – have lead a large number of professional athletes to keep their sexuality to themselves – as most of us do as a matter of course. I would not at all be surprised if it was well known within teams and within locker rooms who is more likely to go home with a man than a woman but out of respect for their teammates, other athletes just keep it to themselves. As it used to be in every profession before the sexual revolution.

But this idea that gays can’t throw footballs is sheer ignorance and absurd stereotype.

Allison no one here has said that homosexuals can’t throw footballs. Steriotypes are often crude and wrong, but still have some truth to them, if only of the self selected variety(I.E. I’m gay and Im going to act the way I percieve other gay people to act). This i believe is the case here.

I think this discussion says a lot about the weak state of intellectual discourse in the English-speaking world. Here is a subject where the Occam’s Razor solution for explaining the overwhelming preponderance of evidence: In brief, that most sports, with the exception of dance-sports like figure skating, appeal more to the masculine than to the feminine, and straight men are more masculine on average than gay men, just as lesbians are more masculine on average than gay women, so jocks are disproportionately straight men and lesbian women.

And, yet, even (or perhaps especially) among the highly intelligent who read this blog, the obvious answer to this question isn’t visible, even to a man of the world like Tyler, because political correctness preaches that everybody must be the same.

It’s really quite stunning how we have disarmed ourselves of the most obvious tools for understanding humanity.

“In the last 12 months, three world- class Canadian figure skaters have died of AIDS. Another Canadian skater, Dennis Coi, a former junior world champion, died in 1987 of the same disease. John Curry of Britain, a former Olympic champion also suffering from AIDS, returned last month to his home in England to spend the remainder of his life. ”

Lots of good comments, but most people seem to have not spent much time in locker rooms recently. Of all the places where macho guys do their gay bashing, it is the most concentrated in the locker room. I’m not a particularly PC person, but it is almost sickening to hear at times, and is unlike any converstations you are likely to hear elsewhere in society. It would be (and I am using hyperbole here) like being Jewish in a room full of macho, loudmouthed nazis. Most people in that situation would probably not advertise their background.

Steve Sailer invokes Occam’s Razor. I suppose that the simplest explanation for why so many here disagree with Sailer is that he (Sailer) is wrong. So I don’t think Occam’s Razor is too useful as a debating point in this context.

There are, in fact, many gay men who are involved in sports, particularly as adults. The 2006 Outgames and Gay Games drew tens of thousands of participants. Perhaps this has something to do with wanting to keep in shape and remain sexually attractive (something a lot of straight men don’t care much about), or simply it is the opportunity to do something that feels naturally masculine but that we shied away from as kids. With all this talk of figure skaters and choreographers, it’s worth mentioning here that many gay men go out of their way to behave in typically masculine ways (compensation).

I do agree that gay men often don’t like playing team sports with straight men. It can be uncomfortable for everybody.

(Sebastian, you beat me to the punch. I was trying to explain that not all gay men have the same kind of sex.)

For your information andrew I did play a team sport. I played high school football and I even had a homosexual on my team. How bout that! And high school is probably the hardest part of life a homosexual has to go through if he’s come out during high school. Sure all of us were a little skeptical at first when we showered and changed but that was just immaturity. It wasn’t like this guy was going to try to make a move on us. He was just like us except for his sexual orientation. And whoever said that gay guys are feminine is wrong. This dude was like a freight train when he had a full head of steam and could knock you over. He ended up being a good friend of mine and we still keep in touch.

Sailer’s stuff on AIDS caught my eye as interesting data. I’m glad you guys pointed out the possibility of differences in sexual conduct among the sports—that didn’t come to my mind immediately. That seems plausible and to at least leave the question open.

Still, we should admit there’s more than scientific curiosity at play here.

I didn’t mean to imply that anyone was ill-intentioned, only that the dividing lines of this discussion and its tone have had mainly to do with feelings (and not facts) about homosexuality.

Sailer’s stuff on gays is interesting. So too, for that matter, is some of what John Derbyshire has to say. Both have thought carefully about homosexuality. And yet… My sense is that they both throw facts around to be shocking and to lend some air of thoughtfulness to what is actually just a thoughtless, visceral dislike of homosexuality.

Derbyshire admits as much. He says that he, like most people, finds it disgusting, etc. I appreciate his honesty on the matter, and I still think he is a talented writer.

Sailer’s arguments above stand or fall on their own. I only indicate that I suspect he is not simply scientifically curious on the matter, and the matter-of-fact tone and expert-hat he is wearing in these comments are political ploy.

Here is an example of how carefully and intellectually honest Sailer is on the topic of, e.g., gay marriage:

“But if gay men become some of the most flamboyant participants in weddings, will more of the vast majority of straight men who aren’t metrosexuals just decide to skip the whole punishing process and stay single? If this drives up the illegitimacy rate, society as a whole will suffer.”http://www.isteve.com/Decline_of_the_Metrosexual.htm

Neither theory is actually politically significant. I don’t know any gay person who would be irked to hear either. I was just pleased to hear a clever argument to counter #2, which is the usual thing you hear.

Sailer is a self-styled “unPC” guy, who commented that “even (or perhaps especially) among the highly intelligent who read this blog, the obvious answer to this question isn’t visible, even to a man of the world like Tyler, because political correctness preaches that everybody must be the same.”

That is why I labeled him “self-consciously unPC.”

All I meant by saying that there was a faction of well-intentioned people sticking up for gays, was that there was just that—as when, Allison commented “But this idea that gays can’t throw footballs is sheer ignorance and absurd stereotype.”

Anyway, as Phil noted, this meta-talk is tiresome, and I’ll stop here. I would just encourage people to check out Steve Sailer’s website and see that he has written many interesting things, but is often just a crank with an axe to grind.

“but I strongly believe that if you took a random group of 1000 American men, you would find a surprisingly high percentage of them have had “male/male sexual contact† at some point in their lives, whether they’re gay or not”

Really don’t know what to say in response to stuff like this. Is there any point?

Now, unless athletes are especially careless with their doping needles, I think there is a fairly strong case for using AIDS rates as an orientation proxy – especially when the differences are so extremely striking.

I’m open to differences in sexual habits between sports (although the notion of prude NBA / NHL / NFL players seems a bit quaint, but who knows?), but we are talking fairly extreme differences here.

very interesting thread. i’ve often wondered why there are so few gay professional male athletes, as i had the same thought echoed by many here — relative to the percentage of the population that is thought to be bisexual or gay, why would the percentage be so much lower in this one area? many commenters have valid hypotheses, but some assume that the percentage is actually lower, not simply that many men in professional sports choose to lead a straight life and deny their true feelings. having said that, i (a woman) played three sports at a liberal arts college known for its large gay student population, and while many, many women on my teams and others were gay and out, or at the very least lugs, i can think of very few out gay men on any of the teams. this was a school where i would find it hard to believe a gay soccer or squash player would not feel comfortable coming out, so i do wonder if fewer gay/bisexual men continue to play competitive sports after a certain age.

on an aside, look at what does happen when a pro baseball player is rumored to be gay. mike piazza took out an ad, did he not, to deny his homosexuality? how could anyone feel comfortable being out in an environment where people will go to such great lengths to deny such a thing?

it’s accepted that many male actors are gay, but yet when you look at the most famous/popular male actors, very few are out. i’m guessing that professional athletes mirror this to some extent — there are many men who play sports who are gay, but when they get to the top echelon of their field, the gay men who make it are much less likely to come out, for reasons #2, #3, and #4. (though i’m by no means positing that the percentage of non-out gay male actors is the same as non-out gay male professional athletes, because i think there are WAY more of the former).

“As for the whole debate about whether gay men are as masculine on average as straight men, get a clue people. We aren’t, generally speaking–I have never in my life met a straight “twink”–and people who try to argue otherwise are really just talking out of fear that stereotyping of this sort will lead to gay bashing. I appreciate their concern, but let’s not deny reality. :-)”

Yea, and as for the stereotyping, is really the notion that gays are more likely to be fashion designers going to be terribly damaging to gays? Especially when the discussion moves beyond the sterotypes, as in “how many gay murderers are there compared to the general male population?” or “What is the gay contribution to the arts?” or “What is the average income of gays?” etc. My hunch is that the social profile of gays that emerges will be not poor at all. It would certainly be preferable to today’s situation, where society is either dominated by PC willful ignorance (public debate, etc.) or adolescent anti-gay prejudice (high school, etc).

This is the second time I’ve seen Sailer get involved in a discussion on a very politically charged topic (the other being Malcom Gladwell’s car salesman discussion) and I’ve got to say I find it extremely enjoyable. Just like with Gladwell, there is a knee jerk reaction against Sailer because his ideas are “offensive”. When he cuts down the arguments against him, his attackers then resort to personal attacks and arguments like “my wife’s brother had a friend who was gay and he could throw a football, so there’s obviously no connection whatsoever between athletic ability and sexuality”.

I don’t know if Sailer is correct and quite frankly, I don’t really care all that much. Stepping back, I think the real issue between Sailer and his detractors is that Sailer looks at populations and says that “based on analysis of the data, group XX has a tendency to do/be/think XXXX”. This doesn’t mean that every member of group XXX will do/be/think the same, but only describes certain general characterisrics. This is the study of group dynamics. The detractors, who I think tend to be well-meaning and not wanting members of group XXXX to feel like they are being pigeonholed, do anything they can to discredit Sailer’s arguments and when they can’t do so rationally, they resort to name calling and their “faith” that everyone is equal and the same.

Bottom line, I think we need a better overall understanding of group characteristics but also realizing that one’s group is not necessarily one’s destiny.

But this idea that gays can’t throw footballs is sheer ignorance and absurd stereotype

It’s not a question of can or can’t, it’s whether or not they want to.

I think it’s pretty plausible that gay men, in addition to not having an attraction to women, also aren’t attracted to some of the things which heterosexual men tend to be attracted to–like sports and violence.

The idea that gay men don’t have enough drive for the highest level sports (enough that they would be 4% of the population but 0% of athletes in team sports) is just silly. Now if you want to argue that they are self-selected/otherwise pushed from them such that they are somewhat less represented, fine. But the whole ‘not enough testosterone to make it’ idea is just silly. First you are basing the idea on the homosexuals that you as a straight man can recognize on your own. That would tend to be the less masculine ones, correct? Second, you think that because the non-testosterone issues don’t always come up.

Anecdote from the volleyball community. Uvaldo Acosta was an excellent outside hitter and in 1991 was voted as the best defensive player in the world. Late in 1991 his open secret came to the attention of the US Men’s Team coach. In early 1992, he was sidelined never to become a playing member of the Men’s national team again. This despite the fact that the Men’s team at the time wasn’t well known for having the defensive depth to sideline the world’s best defensive player–especially since Uvaldo’s back row hitting was better than Eric Sato’s (who was an excellent player, but not in Uvaldo’s league at all).

Ironically (from my point of view), Uvaldo was replaced in the outside hitter position by someone who has also turned out to be gay (though who obviously didn’t come out until after the end of his volleyball career).

There are gay men who have the drive to succeed at international level team sports. The idea that there are zero closeted gay sports figures is just silly.

I’m from a military family and have been around soldier and Marines my entire life. I grew up being told over and over that the more macho the unit, the more gay it was. But not openly gay — most small-town male teenagers who ended up serving as Rangers or paratroops were too clueless about their sexuality and tended not see homo-erotic stuff as in any way homosexual. (And maybe it wasn’t.)

But if you went to a gay club in Frankfurt, Germany, the troops you saw dancing with their shirts off and dry-humping one another weren’t the gay-friendly, more sensitive types who served in military intelligence. Nope, it was the paratroops.

Besides being useful (in all sorts of hard to predict ways), the truth is really, really interesting, while political correctness is skull-crushingly boring. That’s because every truth in the universe is connected somehow to every other truth, while each bit of politically correct cant is just a dead end that doesn’t lead anywhere.

Very true.

That’s what I hate most about PC – first, it’s just dull and make-believe, and second, it is a dead-end.

I agree that percentage married is a good indiicator of homosexuality.

If you look at the military, a higher percentage are married than the general popualtion of the same age. Yet, many of the posters keep claiming that there are a high number of homosexuals in the military. Most professional basketball and football players have been married (most more than once). Yet there are posters here who keep claiming that many of them are homosexual.

Blowhard: Marc’s contention that a guy might have sex with other guys his whole life yet really be a heterosexual is pretty funny. Somebody’s been immersing himself in a little too much “theory”!

The possibility exists. I only said that person who engages in homosexual activities could possibly be heterosexual. I don’t think I said that a heterosexual would actually engage in strictly homosexual acts for his in entire life, especially today. If I did say that, then I agree with you; that is pretty funny. But I did NOT say that, especially when heterosexuality is tolerated AND encouraged by society, today.

Today, in our society and culture, it would be extremely rare, possibly and believably to the point of nonexistence, that a heterosexual would engage solely in homosexual acts; very rare. But use your imagination: if there existed a society where homosexuality is the norm, where heterosexuals were the minority, then a heterosexually oriented person in that situation may choose to engage in only in homosexual behaviors.

BUT that situation definitely does not exist, at least where I’m from. Today, heterosexuality is the norm. It’s a million times more believable that a homosexual in today’s society would strictly behave heterosexually his entire life for obvious reasons. He could act more masculine than Superman, he could have 20 children by 20 different women, but still be a homosexual. THAT idea is much more plausible in today’s society because of social norms, among other reasons.

Regardless, my point is that one’s behavior does not give necessary or sufficient proof to know his orientation. One’s behavior may suggest his orientation, but ones behavior never proves his orientation. One’s orientation is factually known by oneself and no one else. One’s orientation is intuitively known by others. Intuitive knowledge is NOT factual knowledge. Others cannot factually know one’s orientation.

As argued previously, demographic stats based on sexual orientation are NOT worth doing. The only “semi-worthy” demographic stats would have to be based on previous sexual behaviors.

Conversely, no one on the “more straights than you think” side can provide data.

Is one necessarily straight when he has sex with a female? Or is he gay because every time he sees Brad Pitt or any other man he finds attractive he gets horny? Or is he gay because he cannot fall in love with women; only with other men? And how would one know and prove when he falls in love and who he falls in love with?

For the sake of the argument, unless this IS the argument, one must agree to what being gay or straight is: Is it behaviorally based or is it mentally based?

Right now, there is no correct, scientific, or generally accepted answer to that. That’s why we’re arguing.

Yea, and as for the stereotyping, is really the notion that gays are more likely to be fashion designers going to be terribly damaging to gays? Especially when the discussion moves beyond the sterotypes, as in “how many gay murderers are there compared to the general male population?” or “What is the gay contribution to the arts?” or “What is the average income of gays?” etc. My hunch is that the social profile of gays that emerges will be not poor at all. It would certainly be preferable to today’s situation, where society is either dominated by PC willful ignorance (public debate, etc.) or adolescent anti-gay prejudice (high school, etc).

I think a major underlying fear in our society is that if we speak about any vulnerable minority group in anything but a very prescribed, p.c. way, we are re-opening the door to the horrors of the holocaust. It’s a pretty hysterical fear in most cases.

Still, in regard to gays, there is the possibility that frank discussion on the nature of homosexuality may lead, eventually, to a “cure” in the form of gene therapy or hormone regulation among expectant mothers, and thus the “genocide” of homosexuals–at least in those societies wealthy enough to afford the appropriate therapies.

to generally side with Marc, and to reiterate a few things that have already been said:
The categories of gay and straight don’t make any sense. These categories are recent and local inventions, they don’t generalize out to any other time or place. I find that highly generalizable arguments are often very useful things to hold in my head, and I find that arguments that don’t generalize at all are just arguments within boxes.

Arguments about gayness and straightness are inside many layers of boxes. I find the most intellectually rewarding activities to be deconstructing boxes.

“I agree that percentage married is a good indiicator of homosexuality.

If you look at the military, a higher percentage are married than the general popualtion of the same age. Yet, many of the posters keep claiming that there are a high number of homosexuals in the military.”

Are you quite serious? Do you personally know anyone in the military? There are huge economic incentives to be married as opposed to single in the military. The housing allowances and perks alone are enough for many. They are so large that you hear of straight people getting marriages of convenience. Add the fact that being married can keep the “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy at bay and you think that marriage is a good indicator of your idea that there aren’t many gay people in the military? Ridiculous. You people are WAY too theoretical and have far too little actual experience in the areas you are talking about. P.S. you might want to look at the divorce rate….

A lot of the comments above about all those closeted macho men in the NFL and the like are based on wishful thinking verging on gay sex fantasies.

It’s fun to keep a list of some of the unlikely male athletes whom gays and sportswriters have claimed are homosexual (e.g., Sandy Koufax, who has been married twice and currently lives with First Lady Laura Bush’s old college roommate). My favorite example is that frequent subject of rumors, Mets catcher Mike Piazza.
Piazza, a muscular hunk long rumored to be a steroid user, is a natural object of gay sex fantasies.

Yet, the slugger has lived with about ten different lingerie models over the last decade. I have actually heard the argument made, “Well, that just shows how hard he’s working to cover up his being gay. Why else would a man want to sleep with a lot of centerfolds? ”

Piazza is also a metalhead whose obsession is playing heavy metal tunes on his electric guitar. Trust me, a guy whose favorite band is AC-DC isn’t AC-DC himself.

To Steve Sailer: You’ve contributed a lot of creative thinking to this debate, not just in this thread, but in your essay mentioned above. But the fact that your overstate your case can’t be winning many converts.

For example, you’ve commented twice here that gays who disagree with your estimates [about the number of gay men in pro sports] are engaging in wishing thinking and indulging in fantasy. But a claim about the motivations of your opponents is unfalsifiable and does nothing to further the debate.

Most people understand that gays have better “gaydar” than straights. There are lots of good reasons for that which I won’t get into here. But since you are straight, I certainly wouldn’t “trust you” (your phrase) when it comes to guessing Piazza’s sexual orientation. There’s a long history of people rumored to be gay who later came out, or were dragged out. In fact, I’m not aware of any celebrities who have come out or who have been outed, about whom there were no such rumors beforehand. Piazza may or may not be gay. I have no idea and neither do you. That’s the point.

The question of whether there are lots of homosexually inclined dudes who either like women too much or like being thought of as chick-magnets so much or else like being thought of as ultra-masculine so much that they remain closeted–whther actors (cary grant) or nba point guards (magic johnson) or politicians (jim mcgreevey)–well… who knows how many of these types there are. But I think sebastian and alec, being gay, are much more trustworthy on this topic than steve (who incidentally writes on his blog that he is “educating” the readers here.)

Kimura’s sex difference article from Scientific American is also still a useful read.

The same M-F difference in spatial abilities is found in most mammals, can be manipulated with hormones in animals, and predictably varies in humans by exposure levels prenatally and during the lifespan.

Alec and Sebastian almost had me convinced because they really do know more about gays than others here, but I am now reminded that their very knowledge can be misleading. Their acute “gaydar” helps them pick out gays wherever they go, but that almost by definition implies that they pay less attention to heteros who may very well be the norm in certain settings.

I have a curious, semi-subconscious habit of picking out Japanese names in American movie and TV credits and do see them everywhere as a result. That does not mean, however, that Japanese-Americans are overrepresented or even proportionally represented in the industry. (They may well be, but nothing can be inferred from my observation.)

By the way, I like Steve Sailer, but Alec’s and Sebastian’s anecdotes (plus some logic) are beating his blunt assertions here. He’s lucky to have a friend like Michael.

“So if we can agree that gays are likely to be somewhat scarce in some fields (because after all they’re somewhat numerous in others) … Well, which ones are they scarce-ish in? Perhaps certain pro sports. Perhaps not, of course. But let’s at least admit that there are *some* fields where the percentage of gay guys is lower than average. Perhaps we can even edge up to the speculation that gays are more numerous in some pro sports than in others. Would that be too outlandish a guess for you?”

I don’t even have a problem with the suggestion that gay men are somewhat less likely to be found in certain pro sports. My problem with Steve is in magnitude. He seems to suggest that we should expect the ‘somewhat less’ to be ‘vanishingly few’. I suspect there may be 15-20% fewer than the general population. So if there is 5% in the general population there would be 4% in football. I might even buy 20-30% fewer. But it sounds like Steve is suggesting 75-80% fewer, and that is ridiculous. And he is totally wrong about the military. If anything there are slightly more homosexual men in the military than in the general population. If I go to work in a small business, I don’t always expect there to be other gay people. Put me in a similarly sized group of military guys and I fully expect to see at least two or three other gay men. And those are among the ones I can tell!

Dancing is a field that includes mostly feminine-behaved people, male or female. And most would agree that feminine gay males are infinitely more likely to be “out† than their masculine counterparts. Demographic statistics on gay men account for nothing more than those men who say they are gay, men who are out of the closet.

The societal image is to identify with the characteristics one’s gender, sexually or otherwise. Men, regardless of culture or society, are expected to be masculine “macho-men.† BUT what is expected of that man’s sexual orientation and behavior varies by cultural norms, ask any anthropologist. Men have been, are, and will be expected to be masculine, nonetheless. More specifically, today, if one is a man, he must uphold the image of being a macho heterosexual. In Ancient Greece the men were macho homosexuals.

Because of gender roles and upholding a public image in today’s society, among other reasons, there is sufficient reason to believe that countless (masculine, “straight-acting†) gay males actually exist and will NOT be “out,† and therefore significantly distort the integrity of any statistical study on male homosexuals. Therefore, one cannot know the true “national average of gay men;† one knows at most “the national average of men who say they’re gay,† which, with no doubt in my mind, are two radically different statistics.

Your stats are virtually meaningless. There is a societal image that must be upheld. End of discussion.

I think this whole idea of the ancient Greeks being gay is simply a gay fantasy. If homosexual behaviour was more common than today it was probably due to a female shortage. Most pagan socities praticed both female infanticide and polygamy. This creates a gender imbalance whicj leads to more homosexual behaviour. you seem the same thing today in prisons- heterosexual men cimmitting homosexual behaviour because no women are around.

Again the average difference between gay and straight males on a targeting task was approximately 1 SD! Golf requires strong visuospatial skills which are determined, in part, by male sex hormones at timed developmental stages.

“A long time ago, the Ancient Greeks were culturally homosexual. That is, they culturally engaged in homosexual behaviors. Socrates, Alexander the Great, the brave soldiers, the masculine athletes, the knowledgeable scholars, the students, the wise philosophers, the worshipped gods, or the mythical heroes like Achilles and Patroclus were all homos and wrestling, for example, was a popular sport by the Ancient Greeks that was practiced by oily men in the nude, which is pretty gay. Homosexual men ruled the land and used women to have children, to be slaves, etc. Back then, it was considered completely normal to be homosexually oriented AND to engage in homosexual behaviors.” – Marc

Ancient Greece was culturally homosexual? Who are you kidding? This sounds like a gay version of the still popular “Out of Africa” theories, where the Egyptians, the Jews, and even the Greeks were really all blacks until white people came along and stole their culture. Blacks want credit for Egyptian and Hebrew culture, while some gays want credit for Ancient Greece.

There is certainly evidence that homosexual behavior was somewhat acceptable in Ancient Greece. But there is no cultural evidence putting it on an even level with heterosexuality. Greeks were as obsessed with female beauty as any population. Their god of love, Aphrodite, was female. While Cupid was male (usually a young boy or infant) his place in culture was secondary, and not generally connected to homosexual love. There are temples dedicated to Aphrodite, but not Cupid. Greek plays and histories centering around relationships between men and women are common: Helen of Troy, Lysistrata, Oedipus Rex, and all the rest. Greek homosexual culture, such as Sappho, does exist, but it’s not nearly as broad and deep as the culture that celebrates male/female relationships.

samslick wrote: “I think this whole idea of the ancient Greeks being gay is simply a gay fantasy. If homosexual behaviour was more common than today it was probably due to a female shortage. Most pagan socities praticed both female infanticide and polygamy. This creates a gender imbalance whicj leads to more homosexual behaviour. you seem the same thing today in prisons- heterosexual men cimmitting homosexual behaviour because no women are around.†

I’m sure there were no female shortages in Ancient Greece. The land was not controlled like a prison where men must be separated from women.

But I do agree when you say men in prison, especially American prisons, do engage in homosexual behavior at a higher rate; anyone would agree. And maybe that’s because there are absolutely no women inmates. But the cause of that homosexual behavior is just as likely to be because they are in an environment to further explore their instinctive homosexual desires, their instinctive homosexual orientation. But who or what can undeniably prove a person’s instinctive homosexual desires? No one and nothing.

Moreover, you overwhelmingly have acknowledged a distinct difference between “homosexual behavior† and “homosexual orientation† in your argument. The point I, among others, are making is that “homosexual behavior† is less common today because of cultural norms, while “homosexual orientation† is too veiled to study with reasonable integrity.

And this “Ancient Greek homosexuality is a gay fantasy† is bullshit. To be more explicit, the men of Ancient Greece had relations with BOYS. That, in no way, shape, or form, is a fantasy of mine or most homosexual men.

I am going to have to agree with the author on this point. I believe that a main reason that most proffesional athletes dont come out of the closet is because they dont want to tarnish there image. Proffesional athletes are very conserned with there image. I am also going to agree that most of these guys probably arent gay. Alot of althletes get interested in the sports to attract women to themselves.

Samslick wrote: “Homosexual behavior is less common today because of a more equitable male/female ration†

Humans have a 50 % chance of being born male and 50% female. What would give you a reason to believe that there was a gender imbalance in Ancient Greece that caused more men to exist? Women didn’t fight wars.

From an article (http://www.hhmi.org/cgi-bin/askascientist/highlight.pl?kw=&file=answers%2Fgeneral%2Fans_019.html):
“If there is a large imbalance in sex ratio (if for, example a war killed off most of the males in a human population), there is no mechanism in humans for the remaining individuals to produce more males to take their place. Part of the tragedy of World War I in Europe was that so many men were killed (the so-called “Lost Generation”) that a great many women from that generation never married-in part because there really was a shortage of men.

After reading that, ask yourself: Sure, many women didn’t marry, but is it likely that the effects of World War I made many women become lesbians because of an unbalanced gender ratio?

To Samslick: So what shapes society’s attitudes? Many things do; most notably, religion. Religion (and society’s attitude toward religion), doesn’t necessarily shape culture by itself but it is a considerable factor. Culture (and society’s attitude toward culture) unquestionably shapes the behaviors and views of its people. So religion is a considerable factor in shaping the behaviors and views of its people.

And let’s forget about Ancient Greece because it is history and it is only one cultural comparison.

Here’s an additional cultural comparison:

One can go to New Guinea, today (right now), and witness the ritual homosexuality of the Etoro tribe with his OWN eyes. What is the homosexuality rate of that culture? If homosexuality is defined behaviorally as Americans define it, then the rate of homosexuality of that tribe is around 100% (which is comparable to the deemed heterosexuality rate of the NBA) because Etoro men are expected to behave homosexually.

Here’s the problem: There a ridiculously high population of deemed homosexuals in one culture (men of the Etoro Tribe) AND a ridiculously high population of deemed heterosexuals in the other (men of the NBA, or men of America). It’s not believable. It’s impossible to believe that vast majority of the Etoro men are “true† homosexuals just as it’s impossible to believe that the vast majority of the NBA are “true† heterosexuals. Nature is just much more balanced than that.

And before anyone tries to refute my argument by saying “men of the Etoro tribe have homosexual genes. Therefore, they’re gayer,” I am going to disagree with them before they even say it.

Homosexuality is not like skin color, eye color, etc., where they can be traced and predicted through generations of families, ethnicities, nations, etc.

If a person has darker skin, there is reason to believe he’s of African descent; he has the genes of an African. But homosexuality exists in various parts of society and the animal kingdom: homosexuality is found in today’s world, was found in the ancient world, and is seen today in non-humans like those homosexually-behaved penguins, giraffes, and so on.

So where does one trace the “homosexual” gene back to, assuming it exists? Where is the “homosexual† gene’s source? If we can say “dark skin implies African descent,” can we then say “homosexuality implies Etoro Tribe descent?” Not at all. Homosexuality is found in too many diverse humans and animals throughout time to have a given source. The “dark-skin† gene has a source in Africa unlike the “homosexual† gene, which doesn’t have a source (unless one considers “various humans and animals throughout time† a source.)

Genetically, a person can conclude with reasonable integrity “My biological mom and dad have blue eyes, therefore I can’t have brown eyes.” [[In genetics, recessive “homozygous” (not to be confused with “homosexual”) traits, like “blue eyes,” in parent cells don’t produce dominant traits in their offspring, like brown eyes.]]

But, he can NOT make such conclusions based on sexual orientation. He can NOT reasonably conclude with integrity “My biological mom and dad are both homosexuals, therefore I can’t be heterosexual.”

Studying homosexuality on a genetic level is impractical and just plain silly.

Professional sports is a very popular pass time for the United States. It is often referred to as ‘what men do’ and such. If a player was to “come out of the closet” it would affect the everyone involved with that sport, team, and player financially. For the most part, the coming out would attract negative attention for not only the one player, but the whole team, therefore maybe a loss in the sales of clothes or what not with the team name. Not that I am saying it should make a difference, but the chances are very likely.

Craig, you are partially right. There is no substantial proof of the homosexuality rate (other than the art, literature, etc., that were left behind to be interpreted by scholars) because Ancient Greece is long gone. There were no statisticians back then like we have today. And I agree, the fact that men dominated the society does not prove its gayness; that was NOT my argument.

But I do remember giving a few unbiased internet resources to back up my argument (that the homosexuality of Ancient Greece is comparable to heterosexuality today). When speaking of an ancient culture, like Ancient Greece, one doesn’t depend on statistical proof as one would today. One depends on what was left behind to be studied and interpreted by professional historians. And one depends on Answers.com to share with us those professional studies.

Assuming that pederasty (a relation between a man and a boy) was actually considered “normal,† like the source claims, then the word “normal† automatically puts it on a level with the (“normal†) heterosexuality of today.

And maybe Answers.com may not be THE authoritative source of historical information on Ancient Greek culture but I have no reason to believe their data is significantly biased or untrue. (Moreover, if you so desire, you may sue that website for millions for giving false information if YOU can prove that their claims are false. Go for it.)

As I’ve said, I’m using Ancient Greece as a cultural comparison. I also remember using a second cultural comparison: the Etoro tribe of New Guinea. What have you to say about them? That the tribe doesn’t exist? That my anthropology professor lied to me? That Answers.com is wrong again? That most of those men are actually heterosexuals in their hearts?

The only thing that can be proven today is that ideas of homosexuality are different in different societies. For example, one doesn’t need to read historical literature to witness the homosexual behavior of the Etoro tribe today. Some cultures accept homosexuality while others don’t, it’s that simple.

——

Other factors may exist for why the majority of men are (deemed) heterosexual in the NBA, but the social factors that I speak of shall not be ignored or belittled. I’ve always wished that sexual orientation could be reasonably justified genetically just to give society a scientific reason to be more accepting, but genetic explanations of sexual orientation are weak. Social factors have the strongest explanations. Here’s why:

Think of this way (and please, use your imagination):

Chinese people tend to eat Chinese food, not necessarily because Chinese people strictly like Chinese food but because the Chinese culture encourages Chinese people to strictly eat only Chinese food. There’s no genetic relation to being Chinese and eating (nor liking) Chinese food; that is cultural. Any Chinese person may, in fact, not like Chinese food. There is a sound reason to believe that maybe (and, it’s just guess) the majority of Chinese people, if they grew up in an environment that did not encourage eating Chinese food, may, in fact, not like Chinese food because they eat some other food. If a Chinese person grew up in America, occasionally eating Chinese food, he may find he actually likes both Chinese food and American food.

Analogically, there’s no genetic relation to being heterosexually-oriented and engaging in heterosexual behaviors; that is also cultural.

American men tend to be heterosexually-behaved, not necessarily because they strictly like girls (are heterosexually-oriented) but because the American culture encourages American men to strictly behave heterosexually. There is no genetic relation to being an American man and behaving heterosexually (nor liking girls, being heterosexually-oriented); that is cultural. Any heterosexually-behaved American man may be, in fact, not heterosexually-oriented. There is sound reason to believe that maybe (and, it’s just a guess) the majority of American men, if they grew up in an environment that did not encourage heterosexuality, may, in fact, not like girls (not be heterosexually-oriented) because they are engaging in homosexual behavior. If an American man grew up in a culturally non-heterosexual environment (like Ancient Greece, or the Etoro Tribe), he may find that he’s both heterosexual and homosexual; that he’s actually bisexual.

Cultural standards put an “idealistic† veil over the true nature of people, their desires and instincts, sexual or otherwise. Out of the world’s population, there is likely to be an extremely small percentage of people who are strictly homosexual or strictly heterosexual (just as there’s likely to be a small percentage of Chinese people who strictly like Chinese food). The vast majority of the world population would find that they would like both men and women if they were raised in a “sexually-blind† culture (where philosophies and ideologies of sexual behavior do not exist). I identify myself as a homosexual, but am by no means strictly homosexual. As they say, “don’t knock it until you try it.†

Sexual orientation is not simply black or white. One is not simply gay or straight based on his (sexual or nonsexual) behaviors. It’s more complicated. Think of sexual-orientation like a smooth spectrum from black, to dark grey, to grey, to light grey, to white. Where “black† represents homosexuality, “white† represents heterosexuality, and “shades of grey† represent bisexuality. Most people would be some shade of grey in the spectrum, some kind of bisexual. I believe the “central limit theorem† would apply to this aspect of human nature as well. The minority of the population is strictly homo- or heterosexual. The vast majority is bisexual, half of those are bisexual with a gay preference, half of those bisexual with a straight preference.

A normal distribution applies to sexual orientation. That “normal distribution† implies most people are truly “bisexually-oriented;† half are “bisexual with a gay preference† and the other half “bisexual with a straight preference.†

Society skews this deemed normal distribution by veiling the true sexual natures of people with its culturally ideal and beliefs on sexuality. Our American culture, for example, skews the normal distribution to make one believe that the curve is towards the heterosexual side of the spectrum, where strict and true heterosexuals are in the majority, while everyone else is in the minority. Within the “gay culture,† for example, the normal distribution is skewed to make one believe the curve is more towards the homosexual side of the spectrum, where strict and true homosexuals are in the majority, while everyone else is in the minority. Both of those cultural skews are wrong.

So to make my point clear and simple:
Bisexuals are the majority of any culture. Half of those bisexuals have a gay preference and the other half have a straight preference. Cultural ideologies of how humans should be SKEW the normal distribution of what humans actually are by making false connections between sexual behavior and sexual orientation.

“Males do not represent two discrete populations, heterosexual and homosexual. The world is not to be divided into sheep and goats. It is a fundamental of taxonomy that nature rarely deals with discrete categories… The living world is a continuum in each and every one of its aspects” — http://www.kinseyinstitute.org/research/ak-hhscale.html

“…some men may identify as heterosexual because the only activities they engage in with other men do not involve anal sex (or more commonly, do not involve being the bottom in anal sex). This kind of ambiguity is problematic because some people maintain that exclusivity is part of the definitions for monosexual orientations, others feel that only one’s current situation is what matters (if one is in a heterosexual marriage, they are straight)” — http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisexuality

“Measuring the prevalence of various sexual orientations (e.g. heterosexuality, homosexuality, bisexuality, and asexuality) in a large population can be a surprisingly difficult task. One reason is that survey data regarding stigmatized or deeply personal feelings or activities are often inaccurate. Participants often avoid answers which they feel society, the survey-takers, or they themselves dislike. ” –http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_sexual_orientation

I said, “Through this reasoning, I strongly believe the majority of men actually have, have-had, or will have some form of homosexual desire that is not, was not, or will not be acted on because socialization represses homosexual behavior and encourages heterosexual behavior.†

Here’s a small point that I forgot to add:

If the majority of men have, have-had, or will have some homosexual (or heterosexual) thought or feeling of any magnitude, as I believe to be true, then the majority of men are more or less both heterosexually and homosexually oriented; that is, the majority of men are to some degree bisexually oriented. And whether the majority admit it (or act on it) is only relevant to the majority’s behavioral choices; it is not relevant to the majority’s true sexual thoughts or feelings, its “orientation,† as I am concerned.

Sexual behaviors are both influenced and instinctual but are always chosen by the individual. And one’s behavioral choices are influenced in this way or for this reason: cultural standards (i.e., the majority who need to feel accepted by their peers) or defiant instincts (i.e., the minority who behave regardless of cultural views).

On the other hand, sexual orientations (i.e. sexual thoughts and feelings) are not chosen, but they are able to be kept hidden AND actually are kept hidden for a variety of reasons, (i.e., societal standards or one’s personal beliefs). For that, the actual sexual thoughts and feelings of the population, without a doubt, can only be assumed.

The majority of the American population undeniably behaves heterosexually, there’s no argument there. But that is completely irrelevant to what should be of concern which is the actual homosexually-oriented thoughts and feelings of the population.

Luckily, the sexual arousal of a man is observable and damn near impossible for a man to hide (that is, men have an “erect penis† physiology, if you don’t know what I mean). And what sexually arouses a man would make the assumptions of his orientation, his sexual thoughts and feelings, more credible. It would do well if demographic studies on male sexual orientation were based accordingly (i.e. measure his reaction to variety of “stimuli†). Only in that case will demographic studies be able to assume (with reasonable integrity) the true population of “homosexually-oriented† men.

And because this forum has kept quiet for a while, I’ll probably back off after this post.